Leader discography

This is an album-based discography (as opposed to session-based) to Charles
Mingus's recordings as leader
(sideman discography is also available).
Both authorized and unauthorized recordings are listed here among with
few unissued private tapes, but information about unauthorized
recordings will be moved to "Information" sections of their
corresponding authorized releases as soon as they become officially available
(e.g. Revenge!). Therefore this
'brief discography' aims at listing every Mingus release (even with
minor differences) needed to make a complete collection of Mingus's recorded
output as leader (to make a complete collection of every Mingus release is
another issue and not dealt with this discography).
Information about duplicate releases can be found in the
"Information" sections of the releases which I consider to
represent the content in the best possible way, usually in the
following order:

authorized instead of unauthorized (e.g. "Revenge!")

the most complete package

availability

While this discography is based on CDs, LPs are included if the
same material is not available on CD. You might also want to check
the syntax, although everything here is
pretty self-explanatory. Albums marked with '*' do not exist in
separate HTML files.

What's New?

This page was last updated Oct 25, 2007 and
some of the modifications include:

removed lots of personnel/release information from many releases that had material
from the Birdland broadcasts of 1961-62 in favor of... a discography of
The Birdland Broadcasts 1961-1962. [July 17, 2004]

1) fixed an error on Parkeriana where the
release number was accidentally 1524 instead of 1530 - more info for this
release still needed; 2) split the blues medley on Live
In Chateuvallon, 1972 into three parts (it was previously in two parts).
[June 28, 2004]

changed Charles Mingus Trios
on Jazz Door from two-disc set to a single disc. Thanks go to Vinicio Zanetti!

June 28, 2004 update: For alternative information you might
want to check out the Charles Mingus
Discography Project at www.jazzdisco.org,
which hosts a session-based Mingus discography. One problem I have with
that discography is that it's not annotated and the sources aren't cited
(well, I haven't done that always either...) Therefore if you need to be sure
with some information, double-check it with some other discography, such as
Priestley's on which this site is largely based on.

This is the first known recording where Mingus was leader.
Later, each player of this session often played with Mingus.
Spaulding Givens and Mingus even had a duo Strings And
Keys, which recorded an album for Debut in April 1951. That
was also the first album released by the label found by Mingus and
drummer Max Roach.